


Enough

by JaqofSpades



Category: Veronica Mars (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-27
Updated: 2012-12-27
Packaged: 2017-11-22 14:29:36
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,271
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/610832
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/JaqofSpades/pseuds/JaqofSpades
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He's had enough of a life so fucking sad that the highlight of his month is being bailed out of jail by a girl he's not even sure he can call a friend.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Enough

**Author's Note:**

> For hanitje as part of Wishlist_fic on LJ, who prompted “Season 3, based on Francise Capra's confession. Weevil is tired and cranky after V bails him out of the jail, and he kisses her. She asks about Lilly, and he says he's moving on.”.

It hits him at some point during his fifth hour in lock up. This damn cell feels more like home than his shitty little shoebox does, and there's something so fucking pathetic about it that he's in a filthy mood when she comes to bail him out.

Eli is sick of ending up in jail at the drop of a hat. He hates the fact that Veronica Mars has to keep money on hand for his fucking bail money. He's had enough of a life so fucking sad that the highlight of his month is being bailed out of jail by a girl he's not even sure he can call a friend.

He follows out to her car and boosts himself into the passenger seat without saying a word, answering her questions about the charges with monosyllabic grunts. Her mouth thins into a harsh line round about the tenth time he shrugs his shoulders, and by the time she pulls up outside his complex, her movements are jerky with annoyance.

He's already got the car door open when she explodes.

"HEY!"

"Not tonight, Mars. I've had enough. Read me the riot act tomorrow."

He's halfway up the walk when she comes steaming after him, body taut with outrage.

"So, I'm just the chaffeur? 'Home, Veronica' and then I'm dismissed? Really Weevil?"

"What do you want me to say, V? I haven't done a goddamn thing and he's locking me up anyway. You're wasting your time trying to look out for me ... sooner or later Lamb's gonna put me back in that place and there won't be a thing anyone can do, not even you, the girl wonder."

Veronica flushes and looks away, and he hates himself for mocking her. But home truths gotta hurt. And he's breaking his own heart with what's coming next.

"Thanks for coming, V. But next time, I'm calling a bondsman. I ain't dragging you into my shit no more."

He's got his key in the lock when she grabs his arm. 

"Hell no! You don't get to drop that on me and just walk away, Eli. Not without an explanation," she hisses. "Are we not friends anymore? Is it that you don't trust me? Why would you --" 

Her mouth is already open, so he simply slicks his tongue along her top lip and tugs at the bottom one before he dives in to explore all the sweet corners of her mouth. She tastes of those mints she likes so much, he thinks idly, before the realisation strikes him full force.

He's kissing Veronica Mars.

He's kissing Veronica Mars, and she is kissing him back, with tongue and teeth and little sounds of pleasure that rocket straight through him, sending his arousal sky high. Her hands are clutching at his biceps, and their bodies are straining against each other, and she's so far from tasering him it's almost funny. (Because he's thought about this before and that was always a possibility).

Must be why he's smiling when she finally yanks herself away.

"Eli?" Her voice is shaky, and he braces himself for the rejection he knows is coming.

"S'ok, Veronica. I know we're not like that. Just ... can't blame a guy sometimes, you know? All that crap and then ... there's you."

"So - that was like stress relief? Just because I'm here?" she says cautiously, and the hope in her voice is like a fist to his gut. He might have gotten her hot and bothered for a moment, but he's never gonna be one of the rich white boys she likes to date. Doesn't stop him from wanting her, though, and something ornery inside of him needs her to know that.

"Jesus. Stress relief? You're the most fucking stressful thing in my life, girl. And if that's all I wanted, plenty of girls round here would be happy to help out," he says pointedly. "Sometimes I wanna kiss you. So I did." 

Her eyes are wary now, and he snorts in disgust. 

"Don't worry. I'm not stupid enough to think anything's gonna happen just 'cause you like the way I kiss. You can go straight back to pretending you haven't got a clue," he sneers. 

She looks poleaxed, and he wonders exactly why she's so shocked. The fact that he's into her? That he'd managed to keep it a secret for so long? Or was it the way she had kissed him back, all roaming hands and soft little groans of pleasure?

But it's none of those things.

"What about Lilly?" she finally asks.

"Huh? What's she got to do with anything?"

Veronica rolls her eyes, managing to recover some of her sass. "In Neptune? Everything, of course." She bites her lip, and he can see her bracing for what comes next.

"I wondered ... about us ... a few times, but you never tried anything, so I thought ... maybe you were holding a torch," she shrugged, looking away in embarrassment.

"Oh, V. There was torch alright. Big fucking torch. But it was never for Lilly," he says softly, watching her flush as she takes his meaning. "Time just never seemed right. 'Specially when you were with Echolls."

"Because of Lilly," can go damn well unsaid. He didn't feel guilty, exactly, because they'd been broken up when he and Lil started, and when they got back together he had been too cockblind to say no to being her backdoor man. It'd been too easy to hate Echolls on principle, and when he'd seen the bruises on Lilly, he'd been more than happy to jump to the wrong conclusion. Maybe he felt a little bad about that, Eli admitted to himself. Or maybe he just didn't want to be some white girl's plaything again.

So maybe it was about Lilly, a little. But Veronica's no bed of roses, either, and most days, the thought of getting caught up in her drama ...

Doesn't help him at night, he thinks, staring at the glow of her hair under the yellow streetlights. Doesn't help him at all, now that he knows how she tastes, and the noises she makes, and the fact that his bed is twenty feet away on the other side of an already unlocked door.

And she's still here, even though it's long past time for her to have walked away. So he shrugs, and lays it on the line.

"You coming in?"

She chews on her lip so hard it's almost flattering. 

"We're just gonna talk, right? Sort this thing out?"

He snorts and shakes his head.

"It's two o'clock in the fucking morning. I still got the taste of you in my mouth. What do you think, Veronica?"

Her head jerks up and she stares into his eyes as if trying to read his intentions there. They must have been pretty clear (he's a simple man) because she needs to take a long, deep breath and he can't help it. He has to touch her, fingers skimming along her cheekbone and thumb idly stroking her neck. 

She leans into him, and her eyes slide closed for a moment, as if the feel of him is something she's trying to memorise. But when his hands slide down, down over her shoulders, down her back, down to trace the irrestible swell of her ass, she drags in an unsteady breath and steps away. 

"I have a boyfriend," she blurts, and he raises an eyebrow because, yeah, he's met him. Snarski or something. Big white dude. He doesn't know him, and doesn't owe him a goddamn thing.

"So?"

She narrows her eyes at him and her trembling mouth firms with her glare. 

"And that, right there? Why I need to go. See you tomorrow, Weevil."

He knows he won't, of course. She'll be spooked as fuck tomorrow - probably try to avoid him all week, maybe even the rest of the term.

It's probably for the best, he tells himself, but then the door catches his foot and he's kicking it, outraged, losin' it for no reason at all.

*

Veronica stabs her key at the ignition but gives up with a groan when her shaking hands refuse to cooperate. She collapses forward onto the steering wheel and closes her eyes - bad idea. Horrendously bad idea, she realises, as she's claimed by the arousal still racing in her blood.

His hands, trailing fire everywhere they lingered. His mouth, sipping one minute, devouring the next. His eyes, blazing with honesty and heat and want.

The things he'd said.

Just the thought of it - not Lilly, not Lilly, not Lilly - has her fighting a giddy, girlish smile. She refuses to succumb, because her usually-manageable crush is not the point here. She's not free. She's with Piz, doing her best to be a good girlfriend. Letting him in. Being considerate. Ignoring Logan.

And certainly not giving in to the bolt of pure lust that hit her the moment Eli pulled her into his arms.

She tries to hold on to her annoyance, but it's gone completely, lost to the memory of his invitation, and her lie of omission. She had wanted to push the door open for him, and lead him to the bed.

Had wanted to strip him bare, and slide her tongue over every inch of him. Baptised in the name of Veronica, and Veronica, and only Veronica, forever and ever, Amen, she thinks fiercely.

She's not a good girlfriend.

She's not a good girlfriend, but she refuses to cheat on the sweetest boy she's ever met, so she's going to start the car, and drive away, and pretend to sleep as she stares at the ceiling above her bed for the next few hours.

Maybe she's spent enough time pretending, a little voice suggests, but the twin harpies of guilt and idealism are drowning it out, her old friend denial waiting with open arms.

*

She avoids the admin block for a week, even on Friday, when they'd usually catch up over pizza and Coke. Should be beer, he had always complained, until the day she had snuck a cooler into her car, and they'd set up on the beach, putting away enough Corona to force him to call in sick for the rest of the day. She remembers snuggling in tight to his warm bulk as the sun set, watching his profile and wishing she had the guts to just lean over and take the kiss she wanted so badly.

She knew he was waiting for her to make the first move. She'd always known. He was more subtle now than in high school, when he liked to fry her brain with sexual innuendo, but the heat in his eyes was still the same. And it's not like she doesn't know why he'll drop everything to help her out. She knows, okay? She's a terrible person.

There's no way she can ask him to help her out, not until she's made some sort of decision about how to handle this, so Piz finds himself invited on his first stakeout, and she drags Wallace away from his books for a night or two, explaining that he needs a break from studying occasionally. It's not until Wallace and Piz are both committed to a basketball game one night that she realises just how deeply she has settled into hard core avoidance.

She asks Logan to help her out.

The constant flow of chatter is annoying, but she can tune him out easily now, she discovers. She plunges back into her memory of that night to work the scenarios in her head - what if she had gone inside? What if she had been single? What if she knew what she actually wanted?

What if she was honest, she scoffs, and stares out the window. Want would be the easiest variable to resolve. Her body is telling her what she wants every time she hears his name, every time she remembers that kiss, every time she drives past his street late at night. The question is not what does she want, but what is she prepared to do to get it?

"Veronica?"

Logan's question is intrigued, and he has his hand on her knee. She moves it with less tact than is ideal, and redirects his attention to the warehouse across the street.

"You're here to work, Kemosabe. Don't make me call in the big guns."

"You see - I hear you saying that, but I sit here wondering - who are you talking about? Because I'm pretty sure I have the biggest gun around these parts."

The words are out of her mouth before she can call them back.

"Oh, I'm pretty sure you don't."

Logan raises a brow in question, then narrows his eyes as if he can glare the truth out of her.

"What's going on Veronica? Why am I here and not your actual boyfriend, or Wallace, or Weevil? Even when we were together you said I was too ADD for stakeouts."

"Wallace and Piz are at some basketball game," she protests, and thinks desperately for some reason she wouldn't want to take her best offsider on a stakeout.

"Weevil ..."

Logan's eyes widen and he steeples his fingers in front of his mouth to hide his surprise.

"I see," he purrs. "Weevil finally got sick of waiting for you, did he Veronica? He made a move and you didn't like it? Oh, the poor, spurned gangster. Not even good enough to be V's backup anymore."

Five seconds of embarrassment gives way to sheer fury.

"The problem, Logan, is that he made a move and I did like it. A lot. But I'm still with Piz and I'm trying to think things through before I hurt a sweet, kind man for what might not be anything more than a very hot fuck."

Logan's jaw drops at her crudity, and Veronica is so ashamed she has to look away. She tries to focus on the street beyond her window as she gulps air into her lungs and fights the urge to cry. 

"Do you want to?" he asks eventually, voice completely expressionless.

"What? Hurt Piz? No. Be with Weevil?" Veronica looks over, and Logan is glowering through the windscreen, body tense as if waiting for a blow to fall. He'd been hoping they'd get back together, she knows, but this thing with Weevil ... it could kill that possibility. Forever.

But does she want to?

"Yes," she says softly, and she's felled by the sense of relief that sweeps over her, as if her whole body was waiting for this one, small admission.

Now to figure out what to do about it.

*

She cuts her hair. Or, more correctly, has it cut. There's no way she'll ever wield the scissors herself again - too many bad memories. (And one bad haircut.)

There were things she liked about it though, as accidental as it had been.

"Make it sharp, lots of angles," she instructs the hairdresser. "I don't want it to be too girly girl. I'm not that person anymore."

She watches the golden locks fall to the floor, and feels nothing but satisfaction. She's wasted too much time trying to be that girl again, the one who was normal and liked to dance, and thought sweet, shy, preppy boys were just to die for.

Veronica Mars is sharp, and pointed, and has little patience for other people's weaknesses. She eats those kind of boys alive, and it's time she stopped trying to play with them.

She digs her phone out of her purse and makes the call.

"Hey. Do you have some time this afternoon? I know we were going out for dinner, but ... I'd like to talk to you first." 

Piz is silent on the other end of the line, and she knows it sounds like the prelude to a breakup. It was meant to.

"Yeah, come over to our room. Wallace has practice so we'll have it to ourselves."

Veronica can only hope he means "we can break up in peace" rather than "we can make out," because option one will make it so much easier, and option two is no longer on the table.

(She'd feel unfaithful.)

*

She leaves Wallace and Piz's room in a hurry when the accusations start flying.

"You were never really in this relationship at all," he says sadly, and she can't think of one response that would disprove that. "Wallace warned me you weren't over Logan!" and yeah, that'd been kind of true at the time, even if it wasn't now.

"Are you sleeping with him?" he howls, and she takes a step back, shocked. Not just at the accusation, but that he had so much passion inside of him. She'd never seen it before, and that said a lot about their relationship.

"No, Piz, I'm not currently sleeping with anyone. Which is possibly part of the problem. We're not sleeping together and I have no real desire to change that, so - we're not right for each other."

She doesn't say that a single pucker of Weevil's lips does more for her libido than rolling around on the bed with Piz does, or that her period of celibacy nearly came unstuck after a midnight jail run a few weeks ago. She walks out instead, unwilling to unleash her sharp tongue on her newly-exed boyfriend, and heads over to Mac and Parker's.

"I just broke up with Piz."

Parker - who has only recently forgiven her for the whole Logan fiasco - is lying back on her bed pretending not to eavesdrop, but still lifts her head in shock. Mac simply blinks. Girl should at least have the decency to act surprised, Veronica thinks huffily.

"And you're heartbroken?" she asks sceptically, and Veronica's mouth twitches in chagrin.

"Sad for him, mostly. Am I really that much of a bitch?" she asks earnestly, and then chokes when Mac shrugs, then nods.

"You kind of are. But it's not your fault that they fall in love with you, and you just fall in like with them." 

Veronica frowns at a stain on the floor tiles, and rubs at it with the toe of her boot.

"Maybe I just haven't met the right guy yet."

Mac seizes her arm, forcing her to look up.

"Weevil? You're finally going after that?"

Veronica swallows in shock, and her 'meep' has Mac rolling her eyes.

"Come on, Veronica. All the favours and the flirting and the stakeouts? Half of Neptune thought you were doing it on the sly, and the other half figured there was something stopping you. And no matter what the gossip said, I don't think it has anything to do with money, or his record, or the colour of his skin."

"What then? Because I've been going mad trying to figure it out," Veronica snaps. "Why didn't he ever ask me out? Why didn't I ever just say 'fuck it' and make a move? Why am I such a coward?"

Mac smiles and shakes her head. "You just said it, Veronica. He's not just any guy - you think he might be the right guy. Scary stuff for big, bad Veronica Mars."

Veronica heaves a sigh and loops her arm through Mac's. "When did you get so wise, Mac Attack? I need lunch, and moral support to get me through the day. Be my wingman?"

"Long as I get to be Goose. He had all the best lines."

"Take me to lunch or lose me forever?"

"Show me the way to the cafeteria, honey!" Mac crows, ushering Veronica out of the room.

*

They decide to keep it short. 

"Do me a favour?" the text asks, then simply lists a time and a place.

Dog Beach. Sunset.

Veronica's fingers are shaking as she presses send, and when she glances up, Mac looks suspiciously serene. It is the tiny lines bracketing the edge of her mouth that tell Veronica her friend is trying not to laugh, so she sticks out her tongue as much for Mac's relief as her own.

They must have looked mad, bent over the lunch table cackling uncontrollably.

"Welcome to being a teenage girl," Mac says eventually, wiping her eyes.

"Hey! I resent that. I've had boyfriends before!"

"None that you've ever had to work for, like the rest of us," Mac points out acidly. "This is what it feels like not being in charge for a change. Ain't it fun?"

Veronica screws up her nose, then drops the act. "Thanks Mac. For being here for me."

"What friends are for, Veronica. And also to help you pack that hamper. How romantic do you wanna get?"

"Corona. Pizza. Blanket. Don't need any more than that."

"On a Friday night, huh? Interesting."

"Shaddup."

Her phone pings, and Veronica has to steady her breathing before she can look at the screen.

"So I exist now? What do you need?"

She turns the phone around to show Mac, fear sour in the back of her throat.

"What do I say?"

"Tell him it's a date."

"No, I can't ..."

"Tell him, Veronica. Even when you were just friends he would complain that he only ever saw you for work stuff - tell him you just want to spend time with him!"

Trouble with Mac was that she was nearly always right, Veronica fumed.

"Your company. Cold Beer. Pizza."

"Is this a date, Mars?"

"Yes."

"I'll be the one with a carnation in my buttonhole."

"I'll be the one with the taser."

"Kinky."

"You wish."

"Every fucking night."

Veronica stops breathing at that one, and nearly doesn't respond. She has a picnic basket to collect, and pizza to order, and beer to pick up from the store.

One hour and forty-five minutes later, she whips out her phone before she heads into class, and types in the message so quickly she doesn't have to think about it.

"Me too."

*

"You've had a haircut," he says as he folds himself down onto the blanket beside her, reaching out one hand to tug a little at the spiky strands. "I like it."

She fights her way past the sudden attack of shyness to look him in the eye.

"Yeah, I thought you would. You always did, before."

He shrugged massive shoulders and looked up at her through his eyelashes. "I liked the fact that you looked different to everyone else. Unique." His lips stretch slowly into a grin, and suddenly they are on familiar territory. "And it's sexy."

"Oh. Just as well then. I need all the help I can get in that department," she says shyly, and looks up in shock when he guffaws in disbelief.

"Come on, Mars. You walk sexy, you talk sexy - you breathe sexy, chica. You had me hot for you from the moment we met and you know it!"

"We were four when we met, Eli. Kindergarden."

"When we met again, then. When you stopped ignoring my existence. Eleventh grade. Flagpole?"

"Hmmm. Vague recollection."

He smiles ruefully and accepts the beer she holds out to him as they turn their attention to the sun sinking below the horizon.

"I wanted to ask you to Prom," he said, breaking a long, loaded silence. "Would you have said yes?"

She smiles sadly at the sunset and closes her eyes for a moment, thinking of all the things that might have been different.

"Yeah, I would have. Maybe just to see you in a tuxedo, but by then ... yeah."

"Wasted a lot of fucking time, didn't we girl."

"I can't ... I can't regret being with Logan. I think I needed to be. Maybe that wouldn't be over now if I hadn't been with him then," she says slowly.

"You sure it's over now?"

She turns to him fully, and while the face is familiar, the unsure, hopeful look isn't.

"Not really. I think it is. I want it to be, but I can't say I'm sure. I can say ... I want something else right now."

"Yeah?"

She leant closer, bringing their foreheads together.

"Yeah, Eli. I want a romantic picnic with someone I want to spend more time with. And I want to try being more than friends with that person. And I want ..."

She pushes herself into him and traps his full, soft lips between her own, mouth moving slowly, tongue gliding over every contour it can find.

"Wanted to kiss you so badly," she confesses when she pulls back for a breath. "Wasn't the first time, either."

He puts his beer to one side and pushes the pizza box out of harms way.

"Yeah? Wanna show me?" he purrs, pulling her to sprawl full length on top of him. His lips are buried in the hollow of her throat, making her pant, when she finally gets around to answering.

"God, Eli. Enough. We're on the beach!"

"So?" he growls, and this time, it doesn't make her angry. His impatience leaves her breathless and wanting, poised on the brink of doing something outrageous. And probably illegal. She forces herself to breathe, hoping it will cool her down.

"So ... ask me."

"Ask you what?"

She bites her lip and says the words straight into his ear.

"It killed me to say no last time."

His grin is a million miles wide, and it stays on his face through devouring her mouth, rolling her under him, and whispering his plans for her into her skin.

"Ask me," she laughs, and this time, he's happy to cooperate.

"So, Veronica Mars. You coming in?"

"Yes please, Mr Navarro. Yes. Please."

fin 

 

Disclaimer: This fanfiction was written for personal enjoyment rather than profit. No infringement on the rights of the intellectual property owners is intended.


End file.
